In fitness cardio workout is an important key element. There is no sport or activity that does not require the need of a cardio workout. Most common of all cardio exercises is running which provides the body with improved blood circulation, trained breathing lungs and stronger muscle.

Now, not every small town or city has the terrain good running mileage. Running can be quite boring when you run in circles on a football court. Interesting form of running is from one place to another without the need to make circles.

To compensate on running when the weather is not on your side, there are fitness equipment that gives the same exercise results as running in the comfort of your own home; The Treadmill and an Elliptical fitness machine.

What is the difference? First of all, lets make a note that both of the machines are perfect for fitness exercising, They both are able to make the body sweat as if you are running in the park. Sweating means that body workout is ‘on the right track’; blood circulation speeds up, lungs are practiced for better breathing, normalizing heart rate, and etc.

The difference is obvious: Elliptical fitness machines lynch the pain in your joints and ankles that you probably get while running. When on a treadmill, and when running classical style, knees and joints are experiencing impact every time the foot touches the ground. These impacts are quite small in the beginning, but after 10 minutes of running they seriously affect the stamina of your body.

Elliptical machines don’t make this kind of problem. They are designed to rotate the legs in the same manner as when running, without a foot impact on the ground. The feet remain stationary positioned on the pedals and make elliptical rotations.

Balance on the elliptical machine is maintained with two handles for the hands that move forward and backwards along with the movement of the legs. This is the difference between the elliptical machine and the treadmill; the elliptical machine includes the hands in the workout, while in running hands have no role.

But a good thing about a treadmill is that there is an option on it allowing you to lift the treadmill a little higher; simulating running uphill. This type of running is advanced in character and puts more pressure on the thigh muscles giving it more power.

The choice on which machine is better varies from athlete to athlete. Treadmills gives more strength and is much more challenging with the cost of joint pains; the elliptical machine is more for cardio workout excluding any pain in the joints or knees.

So, I was on the elliptical machine that we have at our gym where I work the other day, and I discovered that there was a new way I could position my feet and legs on the machine so that I could really target one of my consistent problem areas – my saddle bags on the sides of my thighs. They are definitely partially genetic, because even when I lose a boatload of weight and am at my leanest, I still have those two stubborn, albeit smaller, pouches on the sides of my thighs, just clinging to them like some sort of extra appendage.

Can you tell I hate my saddle bag problem!? Well, I was working out as I said on the elliptical machine, and I positioned my feet so that it looked like I was sort of walking like a duck, with my toes pointing outward, and as I pumped the pedals on the machine, my knees were also sort of pointed out to the left and right sides of the room I was in.

This actually targets the outer thighs better, because you are turning the work inward from your quadriceps muscles, which get pretty big on me if I don’t watch it and work them too much anyways. This motion allows you to specifically target the thighs and the saddle bag area and tone it. I also make sure I turn the tension way up on the machine, maybe to about a ten or twelve tension setting, depending on what your fitness and muscular strength level is.

Turning up the resistance and simultaneously pointing your feet outward are key to get those outer thighs working and toned up more, so that you can begin to see a difference in their size shrink down a bit (diet always helps too on this stubborn part of a woman’s body), because you are pulling them in by working those outer thigh muscles.

I love this exercise now. I usually do it for about 3-5 minutes at the end of my elliptical workout so I can get the extra toning benefit at the end and that also serves as a cool down for my heart rate since I’m moving slower, but still toning the muscles, which is a great combo for fat reduction.

Wanna give someone a gift that gives and gives for years to come? Buy them a high quality elliptical machine like a, or a treadmill such as a Horizon treadmill or a Proform treadmill, two of my all time favorite brands in home exercise equipment because they’re sturdy, they last forever, and they make it feel like you’re working out in a professional gym because they give the same workout feel and results. Not only that, but around the holidays, especially this holida and possibly next if the economy doesn’t pull itself together, you will be finding some of the best deals- deals of a lifetime on these awesome pieces of workout equipment.

I’ve had my Horizon elliptical for a few years now and couldn’t be happier with it. It’s required no maintenance whatsoever, and I feel like I get the exact same workout as I did when I was working out on a piece of gym equipment that probably costs thousands more. I can guarantee that, like last Chirstmas and the Christmas before, ellipticals will be big sellers.

People love them because they offer a great, intense workout, without any roughness on the joints like some other types of equipment can give, and they also have a reputation for giving ladies the longer, leaner muscles that they want instead of bulking them up because they don’t jolt the muscles and target just one area when they are working out the leg and thigh muscles.

It also strikes me that when I do go to the gym, there are eight elliptical machines, that’s right eight, and you ALWAYS have to fight to get on one, even if the rest of the machines in the gym are empty, this proves that people really like them once they use them and prefer them to add what they need to their workout without adding extra stress to the joints and working out all the wrong parts that they want to get smaller, not bigger.

My personal reason for liking the elliptical machine best out of all the cardio equipment I’ve used is that I have worked up to a point where a half hour is the perfect amount of exercise on one, and I’ve noticed that it’s helped to sculpt down my thighs – my biggest problem area – the quickest out of the treadmill, the recumbent bike and other similar contraptions.

I had an interesting experience today at the gym where I work (for new readers, yes I am lucky enough to have a job that thinks a lot of it’s employees and has an employee gym you can go to on your lunch breaks, before and after work etc.) just today actually. I went in after, I’m ashamed to say, a couple day respite from working out. I was in desperate need of blowing off some therapeutic steam in the gym, and felt as if I were going to explode with all the stress and anxiety that had built up from those previous days of not working out. Ah, the benefits of being a workout junkie, huh?

I’m not saying it’s a bad thing at all! It’s just that, you know what I’m talking about if you work out regularly, it’s almost like you crave it and feel like a giant crabapple if you don’t get it. Which is good! God knows that those who never really got into working out should feel like garbage when they don’t get exercise, but many people don’t even realize what they’re missing out on or why they feel bad, simply because they don’t correlate the two.

Enough with my soapbox folks. My point is, I went to the gym after a break, and found that there were new elliptical trainers, at least I had never noticed them before (disclaimer, I am the queen of oblivion sometimes). So, I decided to hop on one of the new elliptical machines and noticed that after only five minutes I was breathing harder than I normally do with my elliptical workouts, and that I had to actually turn down the resistence so that I could finish my normal 30 minute workout.

I was actually sweating very badly in a highly air conditioned gym that gave me goosebumps when I first walked in – a sign of worsening circulation, probably exacerbated by me not working out for several days. I noticed when I was done that my bangs had actually gotten soaked, something that doesn’t usually happen both because I have them secured and because on the older elliptical machines in the gym I normally did not exert myself so much. You see, the older they get, the less resistant they get, so you just have to start cranking up the resistance on them – no biggie.

I love the Horizon elliptical machine we have, no doubt about it. We’ve now had it for a little over a year, making it one of the first purchases we made when we finally moved into a home where we had room to put a little mini gym, and ever since then it is a staple in both mine and my boyfriend’s workout routine and also a pivotal part of our cardiovascular fitness routine and health.

There’s also another big reason I love our Horizon elliptical though, and that is that I can easily go backwards on it and help shape and tone by buttocks, which of course can always use all the help it can get since I’m a woman and the butt is the most frequent area of fat deposits, followed by the thighs and the upper arms, oh yeah and then the abs, but that is probably where I have the least problems so far at this point in my life (by the way I’m in my early thirties).

What I do it stop using the moving arms of the elliptical machine, and begin to instead go backwards, which tends to feel a little more like you are working the buttocks instead of the fronts of the legs and the quadricep muscles, which is a concern for most women that these muscles will get bigger, not something that many non body building women tend to want to happen.

The way I do it is in intervals, doing about eight minutes of forward movement with my arms moving on the moving arm extensions, and then I take a two minute backwards jaunt, really focusing on squeezing those buttocks muscles so that I can get the most out of it, and believe me, I’m watching the clock still too because although you stop using your arms and maybe the cardio intensity isn’t as high, the muscle work is still hard and requires concentration and focus, just a different kind.

I have found that differentiating my elliptical workout like this by going backwards has indeed helped to lift and shape my butt, so I continue to do it in intervals of eight minutes followed by the two going backwards, and I usually stay on the elliptical machine for a total of about thirty minutes, so it amounts to a total of about 6 minutes going backwards, but it changes it up often enough so you are not totally exhausting the muscles of the butt, however you are creating muscle confusion which is one of the best ways to tone and burn fat.

Elliptical machines are a funny thing. I’ve been on several of them, including my own which I love, the Horizon elliptical machine make, and they all vary in their usability. What I mean is that they vary in how hard they are to use, which means they are probably adjusted to different resistences to some degree, but it also has to do with how high quality of a machine you are working out with as well.

For instance, I went away this past weekend and found that the elliptical I used at another person’s house didn’t quite suit my needs, but not because the resistence was off or it was really difficult to use, but because it had a bracket that my shin bumped every time I came down with my right leg. Had I used that before I bought it, I would have looked for another model. This was one of the best brands of ellipticals (see reviews), it’s just that for me personally it didn’t work out as well as the Horizon does for me.

We paid around eight hundred dollars for our Horizon model elliptical, and I’ve given it rave reviews because it’s lived up to the high quality that one would expect from this brand, including the Horizon treadmills. In fact, I like it better than the ones I use at our fully equipped gym at my place of work, and that’s saying a lot because they have top notch brand names that are of gym quality at my workout facility at work.

The other thing you may want to be mindful of is the leg room. This one I used at a friend’s house seemed to make my knees go at almost a ninety degree angle, and the way I work out, I like for my legs to get more of a real skiing type of experience where the strides are long and drawn out, not like I’m riding a recumbent bike, because I think the two should be different experiences, and the one, the recumbent bike in my opinion, is more of a machine that might work out the quads, while the elliptical should lengthen the quads, almost like pilates does.

I, for one, happen to have a problem where my quads, or as they are termed properly, quadriceps, the large leg muscles that start just below your hips on the fronts of your legs, get absolutely huge when I work out consistently or very hard. But only if I’m doing certain types of aerobic exercise, and I’ve figured out which ones to avoid and which ones to do liberally to keep them smaller so my pants fit me right.

One of the worst things, at least for me, to do, to get big quads, is the treadmill. It may be because I use the treadmill in an uphill climb somewhat, but I also think it’s because I tend to move slowly and deliberately. This also happens to me if I’m running though, so I’ve figured that a treadmill is just too choppy and high impact for me since my quads tend to grow from those types of exercise for some reason.

I’ve found an excellent alternative to the treadmill though, to not build up my quads, is the elliptical machine, because it is designed more with muscle lengthening, and long, smooth strides that elongate the muscle rather than make it contract, as a treadmill can do since it is high impact.

I love my Horizon elliptical, because it provides me with aerobic exercise, but yet it doesn’t build my legs up too much like other pieces of exercise equipment can do.

I’m really a fan of the elliptical machine, in case you haven’t noticed by the elliptical machine reviews we’ve posted on a couple different models here. Ellipticals are my favorite piece of work out cardio equipment because of their ability to help elongate the legs as well as keep them lean instead of bulking them up, like I feel the treadmill does for me.

I limit my use of treadmills because of my body’s personal tendency to get bulky in the quad area and when I walk or run, I tend to use this muscle the most. That’s just me though, I know tons of people, men and women alike, who love what a treadmill does for their body and their fitness level.

I love ellipticals, but I really have a love for ellipticals with moving arms, because they allow me to work on my three biggest trouble spots all at once. Those trouble spots being by thighs, buttocks, and my arms. My arms tend to not get very toned and firm easily, and they do tend to retain fat liek the other parts of my body do when I gain a few pounds, so I love a machine that can target it all at once.

Moving arms on an elliptical, versus the kind with just rails on the side for gripping that don’t move, can mean a lot more challenging workout as well. Just take the test for yourself. If you’ve ever used the one with moving arms, try working out on an elliptical machine without using the arms, and you will see that you do not get out of breath as quickly.

So in addition to getting better muscle toning allover, you also get a little better cardio workout when the elliptical has moving arms. If you prefer to move your arms but are on an elliptical without this feature, then just move your arms in a running motion on your own, and you can simulate this by yourself then.

I know it’s a bit early to be asking for gifts or even thinking about what to buy others. Well, maybe not so much for some early birds who routinely start shopping months early for Christmas so they can avoid the holiday rushed and the inevitably picked over racks of merchandise at malls around the holidays. I myself tend to fall somewhere in between. While I wouldn’t consider myself an early Christmas shopped, I also don’t consider myself a last minute Christmas shopper who is still out on Christmas Eve putting the finishing touches on her Christmas shopping.

Christmas and New Years are one of the biggest times to purchase a piece of fitness equipment. One, because some people have holiday money or bonuses that are burning holes in their pockets and have wanted a new elliptical machine or treadmill for months, and two because we all put on a little extra padding around the holidays because of all the horribly fattening foods, and many people rush out to start their New years resolutions as soon as possible, and purchase the exercise equipment for the coming year, in hopes of starting a new trend of health, fitness and vibrancy.

At any rate, Christmas time and after Christmas is often a wonderful time to get good deals on not only on elliptical machines, but also on popular brands of treadmills like Horizon treadmills and ProForm treadmills, both of which also happen to make excellent elliptical machines. The elliptical has morphed into my favorite piece of exercise equipment. I own a Horizon myself, and I love it. I use it all the time, and it’s just like working out on an expensive piece of gym equipment.

I love the fact that I’m getting an excellent cardio workout in without necessarily impacting my joints hard, or building that big bulky muscle that only guys really want on their legs. Instead, the elliptical is built to help make for sleek and toned muscles, not boxy and bulky muscle tone, because of the fluid movement it creates. For a complete review of ellipticals see Elliptical Reviews, and by all means, please share your experiences through comment postings on your ellipticals or other exercise equipment.

I was at the gym where I work (I’m lucky enough to have a great gym facility where I work), and a gym worker was giving a new member a tour of the gym. She had stopped at the elliptical machines and was answering the new patrons questions about how to operate the piece of machinery, when I thought “wow, I never even thought about how confused I was when I first tried one of these machines”. It’s like the old saying about riding bikes, once you know you never forget, even though learning seemed hard at the time.

Elliptical machines mostly operate on pretty much the same type of system, except the user interface and various controls and features usually vary per the model and make you have. The better models will typically have more options to choose from when it comes to picking programs like up and down hills, cardio, endurance, and manual. Every one of them though, has a manual program, and most will have a control that you can dictate the amount of incline you want to be on, or high high of a grade you want to be stepping on.

They usually all have a resistence adjustment as well. So, if you’re a beginner, you usually will choose the lowest resistence – say a number one, and if you’re more advanced, like I am now, you might choose a 5,6 or 7. I know when many people first start out on ellipticals, they find them very hard to do much time on. Trust me, if you stick to it, in no time you will find an elliptical a much better option than most treadmills, because of the fluidity of motion and more options on how to work out the whole leg, not just the quad and the calves.

Some of the best ellipticals now today that can be purchased for home use, and are just as good as anything you’d get on at the gym are reviewed here on our special elliptical machine reviews page. There are so many out there, and there are some really sub-par ones, it is really worth it to purchase a good one though – they are more stable and provide a much better, more worry free workout than one that is rickety or doesn’t work at the right resistence levels.